Hunting
by Soulreciever
Summary: He remembers the rain…the sound of it on the pavement as he'd stepped out of the car…of how he'd caught the sign on the building in front of him and suddenly that sound had shut entirely away. Angst. Slash. Great game spoilers.
1. The Incident

1. The Incident.

T: In which I leap, eyes tightly shut, into a brand new fandom! Warnings of spoilers for 'The Great game' backwards, possible random characterisation and that things will get slashy down the line! Sir Arthur owns the original, the BBC, Mr Moffat + Mr Gatiss own the modern verse spin and I own the plot!

O

Ugh, why the hell had his body decided to wake him? I mean it's not as though there's any form of daylight somehow working it's way past the extra thick curtains on his bedroom, or as if he's got anywhere to be today…

He frowns hard at that last thought, at how self pitying, how depressive, it sounds and how it's true all the same.

He'd been taken to one side a week ago, told that people were starting to worry, starting to notice the not shaving; the chattering to himself; the thinness of his temper. He'd been asked if everything was alright, the question followed by 'they tell me you were involved in an explosion' at which point he'd snapped.

Because though the conclusion to the matter of the bombings had been…dramatic…it's was nothing worse than what he'd faced while out on the field in Afghanistan. Ok so one couldn't quite roll out of a building that'd just suffered a massive explosion entirely unscathed, not even when you'd had the foresight to hurl yourself into the vast body of impact absorbing water contained within said building. Still a fractured hip really wasn't the end of the world, even if it did decide to remind him of its presence whenever the air temperature dropped even minutely and he'd been sent home from the hospital only a week after the incident.

He'd coped with the bomb, hell he'd even coped with knowing that the entire thing had been somewhat pointless being as Moriaty had also gotten out alive, but he hadn't coped at all well with everyone else assuming he was going to be some form of emotional wreck.

Oh he'd smiled as they'd coddled him, the thing all teeth and clear 'leave me the hell alone' signal that'd somehow gone over even Sherlock's head.

He'd thought because of his flatmates blind spot in the matter of social protocol, thought that as Sherlock had seen everyone else fussing after him and he accepting that fussing, it was the done thing.

Then…

Sherlock had stumbled onto a case while flipping through one of the many cheep magazine's he'd suddenly started having delivered to the flat, a simple little thing centring about some confidence tricksters that'd somehow ended up with him being shot.

The bullet had barely even grazed his skin, the mark left by its passage more burn than actual wound and yet Sherlock had reacted to the entire thing as though he was dying.

It'd almost been worthy of laughter until the younger man had turned on the suspect, eyes alight with the wild fire of anger, and struck him solidly about the head with some object or another.

Sherlock had loomed over the man's unconscious form for a long while after that, face entirely blank, before simply walking away.

It was a typical Sherlock move and, though the younger man's behaviour had been somewhat…unusual…he'd sort of stuffed that fact away for later contemplation. He really wanted to shout at the man for leaving him to clear up his mess _again_ and there was no way he could do that guilt free if he thought that oddness through with any sort of firmness at that precise moment in time.

So he'd psyched himself up, had thought of all the terrible things his flatmate had put him through recently in order to get just the right hint of resignation there to give the whole speech validity and then the text had come through.

'WC1N 3BG. There has been an incident.'

He remembers frowning at the thing, remembers how the Taxi Driver hadn't quite been able to meet his eyes after he read out the postcode and how silent he'd been.

He remembers the rain…the sound of it on the pavement as he'd stepped out of the car…of how he'd caught the sign on the building in front of him and suddenly that sound had shut entirely away.

**National Hospital For Neurology & Neurosurgery****.**

There is a void in his head after that, a days worth of memories pushed deep into his hindbrain along with all the other darker recollections…the memories that contain the blood and the bodies…

Then…then he's told exactly what'd happened and though he knows that sometimes life isn't fair or logical, that sometimes people just die, he knows that it's a lie.

As he watches the casket lowering into the ground all of a day later, listens as Mycroft reels off an empty, scripted, eulogy, he remembers the stillness of Sherlock's face.

At which point he suddenly realises that the lie is being told for his sake, that he's watching some random guy being buried in a grave that will bare Sherlock's name, because it's the best way to keep him safe.

Quite how he felt about what that meant for Sherlock's apparent lack of care was somewhat complicated, how he felt about Sherlock assuming him weak enough to need such mollycoddling, however…

He'd repressed that emotion along with the rest, pushed it to the back of his head with everything else and he'd started setting out feelers in the hopes of finding something to prove that he wasn't going crazy.

He started staying up late, started to forget the simple basics of eating and washing with any form of regularity, started voicing his thoughts out loud in the hopes that somehow they'd make more sense that way…

…Oh of course _now_ he could see how it would look to people outside of his head and can even concede that it'd make more sense to link his apparent decent into madness to the matter of the bomb than to the death of some guy he'd only known for two months.

At the time, however….

Ok so his head was now, officially, circling about the same thought and of course that means trying to switch it off is utterly impossible which, in turn, means he can kiss goodbye to trying to get back to sleep.

He wills himself up and out of bed, secures his fluffy dressing gown and wraps himself tight amid its plush, warm, embrace, before shuffling, some what lopsidedly, down into the kitchen.

It still feels odd to not have to rescue the milk from behind some random Sherlock experiment or another…to not have to sniff at the tealeaves before he places them into the kettle for safety's sake.

Strangest of all is the silence…which is strange in itself considering how little Sherlock had talked during their 'down time', yet he constantly finds his ears stretching out for the sound of clothing shifting against the fabric of the sofa; of fingers tapping some rhythm or another against some spontaneous surface; of the rustle of plastic and cardboard as another nicotine patch is set free it's 'cage'; for a thousand other little noises he'd hadn't even realised were there until suddenly they were gone.

He can't let himself think too hard about what that means either, because he's all ready very aware that it's a veritable can of worms.

Someone is buzzing the flat.

It can't be Sarah because she'd basically been avoiding him since the funeral, had even ended things with little more than a casual text message and it's most certainly not a cold caller given their reputation…

Curiosity eventually wins out and he works his way, slowly, to the intercom

"Who is it?"

"Paterson Guthrie, Dr Watson, Mr. Holmes sent me."

O

T: 'Paterson Guthrie' is the lead in Quinn Fawcett's Mycroft Holmes novels but I'm changing him enough here that you're really not going to have to have read them to get the best out of the fic! Next chapter next week, until then review?


	2. The Visit

2. The Visit.

T: All warnings remain as they were, I own the plot and at least 98% of Guthrie's personality, though his name and everything else you see here is defiantly not mine…mores the pity!

O

Curiosity eventually wins out and he works his way, slowly, to the intercom

"Who is it?"

"Paterson Guthrie, Dr Watson, Mr. Holmes sent me."

Given the frankly startling amount of effort Sherlock had put into 'dying' her can't quite picture him being the 'Mr. Holmes' in question here, plus the formality in the phrasing and intonation of the statement speaks of someone used to a 'higher class' of living which, in turn, all but screams of Mycroft.

He'd not talked to the elder Holmes sibling since…ah apparently not since he'd interrupted that moment of typical Holmesian sibling rivalry…and he'd begun to believe that he was being avoided out of some deep seated guilt for following along with Sherlock's foolishness.

Hmmm, well he wasn't going to prove or disprove that particular theory simply mulling it over in his head and it was likely to be somewhat damp out there right now what with the combination of morning due and the early morning mist, thus buzzing the guy in really was the most logical step forward.

Paterson Guthrie looks as a hundred other men he's passed on the street rushing towards some business meeting or another, all sharply ironed suit and tight crop hair. There are hints, however, that it has not always been as such, the trailing edge of some tattoo or another vanishing its way beneath his left shirt sleeve, the hint of scarring at his left ear that suggests it was pierced at one point or another.

That he is wearing Converses of a pillbox red that visibly clashes with the dark blue of his suit and the hint of…something…there in mismatched eyes, are shows that his recent conformity has been enforced, that he is stubborn enough to rebel a little against said enforcement and yet either too afraid or too nice to push the point too hard.

Each deduction filters through his head in Sherlock's voice and, as he walks this stranger into their living room, he is more than aware that he is missing at least twenty other little details that would bring life and depth to his 'tip of the iceberg' observations.

He falls into the hosting habit of offering and making tea before settling down in his stiff, high backed, chair and enquiring,

"You work for Mycroft, right?"

"I have the honor of being Mr. Holmes's Personal Assistant."

"Right, ok I don't know what 'Mr. Holmes' has been telling you but I'm not completely soft in the head. That means that a) I'm not buying all this 'good little servant' BS you're giving me right now and that b) I do happen to remember things that happened more than a day ago and that I, therefore, remember that Mycroft's PA is a woman."

"Please like someone as self important as he is would only have one PA, though I will assure you that I'm the highest position of authority." Of course one didn't have to be Sherlock to detect the undercurrent of a much larger issue and, somewhat keen to move on before he allowed his 'bedside manner' get the better of him, he enquires,

"So you're here because?"

"He sent me here to give you some paperwork…though he was a little vague on the details."

There had been a letter about that paperwork, a typed, detached thing that Mycroft had signed at some point after it'd been typed and that he'd thrown without really taking in any of the details.

Mycroft was intelligent enough to know that he'd have reacted as such, which well explains Guthrie's presence and yet then why send the man in so very unprepared?

"It's a cover story, right?"

"Yeh, that's what I'm thinking too. You see the truth is that Mycroft is as ignorant as you are about where Sherlock's gotten himself to or what he's up to, which worries him, but of course Mycroft's pride won't let him admit that."

"So why do you think he's really sent you here?"

"To apologies for allowing Sherlock to manipulate him into playing along with his game for this long and to offer you all the help you could ever possibly need to find him again."

"No offence, Mr. Guthrie, but it would have been more helpful if he'd come himself."

The other smiles a warm sort of smile that talks of a friendly, easy going character, or, alternately, the bright falsehood of a conman's charm, before responding,

"I'd tell you that getting his hands dirty isn't really Mycroft's style but I think you know that's a lie despite all Sherlock's done to convince you otherwise. Thing is, Dr. Watson, he's pretty guilty right now, which means he can't bring himself to even talk to you on the phone let alone face to face." The smile grows that little stronger as the other adds, "Plus 'past life' experience means I'm pretty good at this investigation lark."

"You were a Journalist, weren't you?" The instant he poses the question he can see the shape of the logic behind it, can see the little strings of clues connecting together in a beautifully concise whole and yet he can not quite grasp why he had thought to ask it…it is a strange sensation, almost as though his mind is not quite his own anymore.

"I prefer the term 'investigative reporter', Dr Watson, separates me from those wannabes who 'write' for the redtops."

"Ok so now I'm officially curious as to just how that 'past life' leads into you being a PA for one of the country's most powerful man."

"For the moment lets just settle with 'it just kind of happened', shall we?"

A long, stagnant, silence in which they both seem to be waiting for the other to fill the void, before his fatigue warn patience collapses and he breaks the thing with a statement of,

"Ok then, so I'm basically at a dead end right now, so please, offer me some amazing journalistic insight!"

"The first thought would be that he's left because of Moriaty, because he wants to carry on chasing after him without having to worry about other people, however, if that'd been the case…"

"He'd have gone in the hours after the bomb, which he didn't."

"No, which means either he lost Moriaty after the incident and only caught up with him recently…or…" He feels very exposed as that sentence trails away, which is ridiculous, because no matter what his stupid brain keeps telling him there's no way in hell Sherlock's done this stupid thing just because he got shot.

In his minds eye he recalls again the look in Sherlock's eyes as he'd stuck out at the shooter…recalls the sure and certain feeling he'd had that the younger man was going to kill the other right there in front of him.

He feels sick and lost and so desperately in need of a drink that he's up on his feet enquiring, "Care to join me?" without as much as an explanation to the other of where, precisely, he was going.

It's a habit he knows he's picked up from being around Sherlock, from having the younger man constantly reading his thoughts from the strangest of things and answering questions, contradicting conclusions, without him ever giving them voice.

It's also, apparently, something Guthrie is used to as, once he has reclaimed his coat and brief case he states,

"I know just the place."

O

He'd mostly been expecting some form of up market pub on the west end, the sort of pub that 'someone like him' couldn't wonder into without being stared at until one felt uncomfortable enough to leave again. Though a tiny part of his head had thought that, perhaps, the other would lead him to a really gritty back water sort of place on the dock front…a place full of life and character and all the things a journalist needed to make 'connections'.

What he'd not even considered was that the other would lead him right to the grandiose styling of the Diogenes Club and walk him through high, vaulted, entrance hall to a quite little corner of a plush, plush, dining room.

Paintings adorn every nook and cranny of wall space, the fine brushwork and simple subject matter screaming of three figure sums. The chair he's gently guided into is of the really soft, soft, leather that he'd day dreamed over during many a long night of his residency and that he knows costs more than his monthly rent.

All in all he feels small, insignificant and yet somehow Guthrie manages to look at home despite the impression his 'past life' is making still on his appearance.

"So I'm guessing this is some form of cruel journalistic tact? Get me out of my comfort zone so I'm all unbalanced and then get me saying things I wouldn't say otherwise."

"You see and now you're insulting my intelligence. Of course a well seasoned army veteran such as yourself isn't going to crack under such a childish scheme. In truth I brought you here because, unlike your local, you can get utterly drunk and shout your mouth off without fear said shouting being splashed across the tabloids the next day."

There's something else, he's not quite sure how he knows, but the understanding clicks his brain back into the safer path of investigation…has his minds eye splashing the mental image of wild curls and even wider smile, along with the phrase `the games afoot` there in his hind brain.

He smiles for the first time in what seems an eternity, twists a little in his seat to redistribute his weight a little away from his leg and enquires,

"Ok so how'd I go about following through that 'get utterly drunk' plan of yours?"

O

T: Next chapter will hopefully be next week, until then how about a review?


	3. The Club

3. The Club.

Guthrie keeps eyeing the level of his drink, subtly, of course, and yet still he's clearly waiting for the moment where he can call back the stiff suited butler to 'freshen' his glass.

It seems hard to believe that a place such as this would even let him be the level of drunk they'd been discussing without kicking him out, because despite the…gasp…woman he'd spotted sweeping out the entrance on their way in it really did feel like time had sort of forgot this place and it wasn't even as if Guthrie had siphoned them off into a private room.

Which makes him wonder if this is all some form of test, if Guthrie is watching him watching him, knows that he thinks he wants him drunk, and is testing how he feels about it all and wow and that was a line of thought likely to give a man a headache.

What would Sherlock do in this situation?

Ha, of course Sherlock wouldn't have gotten into this situation in the first place; Sherlock would have been at least ten steps ahead of him and stopped this entire mad thing before they'd even gotten as far as the fake funeral.

Ah and there's the self depreciation again like an unwelcome guest come to spoil the sure and certain elation he'd felt as he'd realised that something about this overtly opulent place was a clue.

He takes the tiniest of sips from his glass, the strange flavour mix of sweet and bitter that is the dark rum, tweaking out faded memories full of hard training regime and faces of people long since buried beneath hot, foreign, sand.

"Do you miss being a reporter, ah sorry, 'investigative journalist'?"

"Do you miss being on the front line?" Guthrie responds before smiling somewhat apologetically and stating, "Sorry, that came out a lot harder than I wanted. What I meant was that I'm in the same sort of head place with Journalism as I imagine you are with the Army…you know; it's enough in the past that you've started recalling it all through rose tinted glasses?"

"Yeh I get what you're saying." He responds, pausing to take another, tiny, sip of his drink before enquiring, "So, Hollywood strikes again?"

"Oh no, it's defiantly a big; fast and utterly crazy world, it's just that as a rookie you either broach a big old story and get yourself fast tracked or your stuck pouring coffee and shouldering other peoples workloads."

"You ended up doing the latter?"

"Not for want of trying, in-fact my boss used to tell me I was going too hard after the big fish and scaring them away." He leans forward, somewhat conspiratorially before remarking, "They started calling me 'Tin-Tin' because of all the knocks and bumps I racked up chasing people who didn't want to be chased…I even managed to get myself stuck on the outside of an Underground train."

"You're trying to feed me a line, aren't you?"

"Ooh I wish, in-fact the only reason I'm not smattered all the way across the walls of the circle line is that someone actually pulled the emergency stop…which caused utter panic because, instantly, everyone on board thought there'd been an explosion or something and I ended out on unpaid leave for a few weeks because 'we're meant to write the news not become the news' as my boss put it."

"Ok and now I really don't get how you ended up pushing papers for Mycroft."

For all of a millisecond as Guthrie responds, "Such is life," with a falsely breezy detachment his eyes lift up to focus on something on the wall far on the other side of the room. It's such a tiny, insignificant thing and yet he's so desperate for anything right now that he can't help but be somewhat curious.

Practicing amazing patience he times the downing of the rest of his drink for a moment when the Butler is out of the room and, once he's got Guthrie engaged in the task of refilling his glass, he all but jogs down to the wall in question.

Buildings, old buildings, buildings with images of how they'd looked before the Blitz …ah wait, what's this? A long, tall, gangly man standing proudly behind a group of three boys of varying ages…ah the boy at the centre is unmistakably Sherlock even for all the tiny shifts age has places in bone structure and there is something about Mycroft in the spherical shaped boy to the far right, yet the third…

"Ah, guess I did give myself away after all." Guthrie is stood a few feet behind him, scotch glass balanced delicately in one hand and entirely resigned expression on his face. "You'll want answers."

"Yes and yes."

"See, the thing is that it's not exactly my story to tell…."

"It's alright, Paterson, Dr Watson has proved himself trustworthy on more than one occasion." The roll of Mycroft's unmistakable baritone comes from over a high backed chair pressed tight to the unlit fireplace at their far left and it gives him an entirely guilty joy to see that Guthrie also starts for the sound of it.

Wordlessly he works his way down to one of the other chairs surrounding the sofa and watches, in odd fascination as Guthrie goes to follow suit only to stop a few inches short and tense up…as though he is not certain he is welcome or…

A curious, somewhat random, thought drifts into his head and, though it is not really the right sort of timing, he can not quite help but voice the enquiry of, "Are you two a couple?" out of some almost primordial need to be 'in the know.'

Mycroft smiles one of those 'ah how boring it must be in your head' smiles that he's seen more often than should be admitted on Sherlock's face and then responds,

"Paterson and I are, indeed, 'a couple', in-fact we have been married, legally and illegally, for 16 years now, though I fail to see the relevance."

Guthrie rolls his eyes a little at that, responds, "Curiosity needs no relevance, Mycroft, we've been through this before," before he settles at last into a chair.

"Ah, indeed." The remark is clearly meant as a dismissal of this particular diversion for, almost the instant it has left his lips, Mycroft states, "The picture that so caught your attention was taken upon my Father's induction into Parliament and was hung here upon my election as head of the club likely so that they might show of my 'esteemed heritage' to prospective members…which is somewhat ironic give that placed in the wrong hands it could single handily destroy both my carer and my reputation."

"Because of the other boy in the picture?"

"Perfect deduction, Dr. That boy is known now to the world as 'Themis', the man who killed individuals of the legal profession simply because they had 'strayed from the path of true justice' and yet, back then, he was knows simply as 'Sherrinford Holmes'."

Of course the latter had been somewhat expected for there was a little of each Holmes sibling in the face of the young Sherrinford, yet the former…

"Right, ok, so secret older brother with psychopathic tendencies, it's a somewhat unexpected twist, but as I get the distinct impression that it's the tip of a rather large iceberg."

"Correct again, Dr."

"Great, so is there something in that iceberg that's going to be relevant or is this just a giant show of how much you trust me, or something else along those lines?"

"I'm somewhat of the impression that if we fill in the blank spots in your understanding of Sherlock's psyche you shall be able to determine his course of action these last few weeks and thus, ultimately, deduce where he has hidden himself."

"Right, ok, fair enough…though I honestly think you're giving me more credit than I deserve, Mycroft."

A long glace that says a great deal more than he can actually understand and then Mycroft is taking a deep breath and spilling forward a somewhat abbreviated version of his (and thus by extension, Sherlock's) past.


	4. The Past

4. The Past.

T: In which we begin the process of tying things together so have this extra EXPASISION warning along with all the others! I still own only the plot, 98% of modern verse Guthrie and, I suppose, this particular incarnation of Sherrinford.

O

Tradition had always been a very important thing to the Holmes patriarch, thus his first born son would inherit the running of the estate and all of the responsibly that came with that 'honour'.

Sherrinford knew that fact well and it was that knowledge that had him embracing the role despite the weight it presented…despite his mind and soul being so clearly meant for so much more.

Then Mycroft had been born and, for a little while, it seemed that he would be forced to watch as his little brother lived the life that should have been his…would have salt poured into the hidden wound and be forced to smile at the resulting agony.

Yet Mycroft's soul was a sedentary thing, pushed along simply at the whim of others rather than under any steam of its own and thus his life also became very swiftly shaped and progressed by his parent's desires.

So the brother's continued on, Sherrinford making the right marriage and Mycroft making the right, political, connections, to insure that they might become the men that their parents wished them to be.

At which point Sherlock had come into the picture.

He had, apparently, been conceived in their mother's desperate attempt to have a daughter before Mother Nature took the chance from her and yet, unlike so many others conceived in similar circumstances, the disappointment of his gender had not stopped his mother from loving him.

Indeed the boy had been entirely spoiled by both his mama and papa, to the point that it seemed almost, sometimes, as though they might cater to his every whim.

It was a treatment that'd spawned the dark seed of resentment in Sherrinford's heart, yet the elder Holmes made a show always of doting on his baby brother and, inevitably, the boy began to worship him as hero.

With a cruel, calculated, patience, Sherrinford encouraged this mentality, moulded and shaped the boy until he saw him as the extent of his world and then…

Then, at the large, opulent, party his parents had organised to celebrate both his 21st birthday and, by extent, his becoming 'head of the household', Sherrinford had shot his father at point blank range.

He'd made certain to be entirely alone with the other when the deed was done; that there were no witnesses; that the gun itself had been wiped entirely clean and, most importantly, that Sherlock would keep saying they'd been together the entire day no matter how hard he'd pressed.

Without evidence the police kept stretching and stretching the investigation until, a full month after the event, they locked it away as a cold case. Thus free to do as he wished, Sherrinford sold off the lands that had trailed behind him always as a weight, ploughed the money deep into a property far away in America and 'disappeared'.

Life had moved on.

Mycroft was accepted into the house of lords, began voicing opinions and planning policies that would start whispers of using him to contest leadership, of his one day perhaps claiming the job of jobs.

Sherlock retreated into himself, became obsessed with the workings of the criminal mind and the science of deduction. He gained a name, gained contacts in the police departments and seemed destined for a fast track towards a carer in the force and then…

"Sherrinford had kept in contact with him, the communication a secret Sherlock kept because he trusted our brother implicitly…because he was everything he believed was right and just in this world. Of course it had all been part of the plan, the final glorious act to insure that Sherrinford got the revenge he believed himself due and, on the eve of Sherlock's 18th Birthday, he sent him a letter detailing everything.

"Betrayed entirely my brother suffered a mental break and resorted to…less than legal…means in a desperate attempt to gain back his equilibrium. Of course I could not willingly watch as he destroyed himself, Dr, and my choice to place him into rehab is why I am treated always now as his enemy rather than as his brother or even as his friend."

Of course there had been hint that Sherlock had been involved, at one point or another, in the darker edges of the drugs trade and yet he'd passed it off as some form of strange in joke between Lestrade and his flatmate.

Sherlock was so very smug about his mental facilities, after all and the thought that he would knowingly risk destroying them for something as simple as a 'high' had been entirely laughable.

Even given the mental trauma that would have been caused by Sherlock learning that the brother he'd loved and idolised was as everything he abhorred, he can not quite see the other reaching so very swiftly for such an extreme solution…

"There's a little more, isn't there?"

"Indeed there is, Dr, though this little bit of the story's mine to tell." Guthrie remarks, shuffling a little in his seat before he states, "I had this contact in MI5 at the time, an amazing girl who used to send me little snifters of gossip in exchange for a chat and a fatty pastry down on the South Bank. Right in the middle of the Themis killings she sends me a text suggesting that maybe someone high in government had a connection to the guy and that's how he was staying entirely under the radar. Conspiracy has always sold papers and so I chased the lead, talked to all the people I could until I hit pay dirt, the police were talking to a rank amateur who just so happened to be the youngest brother of one of the guys in contest for leadership. Of course it might be just a co-incidence, so I arranged a meeting between myself and this amateur...

"He was clearly addicted to something and scared…a good journalist knows how to abuse things like that and I'm shamed now to say that's exactly what I did. A little pressure and he was telling me everything, that Themis was actually his older brother, about all the stuff with the murder of their father and the cover up, and finally about how these new murders were being done for his sake. Apparently Sherlock had refused to believe Sherrinford's confession, had written the longest of letters to his brother stating just that and Sherrinford had 'come home' to prove to him just what he really was, as well as how corrupt and unjust society had become.

"He'd made sure to send Sherlock details of who he was going to kill and how…made certain that there would be no doubt in his bother's mind that he was behind each death as it came and that, therefore, each innocent life had been snuffed out simply for his sake."

Ah so that had been why Sherlock had seemed so very detached from the entire scenario with the bombs, he'd had such a thing played out for his sake long before Moriaty had taken an interest in his life and at least this time there had been a stranger at the heart of the matter, a man he might chase and destroy without hesitation.

It also explained that odd moment in the pool where it'd seemed almost as though Sherlock had thought him the man behind the bombings and why he'd been so very relieved when it'd proved otherwise.

The dangerous voice there in his hind brain was whispering that it was explanation also for a thousand other of Sherlock's little quirks, for the distance; the sharpness; the hesitation…

…that Sherlock had, indeed, run away because Moriaty had threatened him and that'd frightened the younger man, because he already knew what it was to lose someone who was as the definition of life.

Ok, keep your head on track John, where would Sherlock go given all you know now?

Clearly after the rehab he'd had a long heart to heart with himself, had decided the best way to make peace with what Sherrinford had done was to bring others like him to justice and thus prove him, at least on some level, entirely wrong about the state of society.

It was the only logical conclusion given all the facts and, as Sherlock had once offhandedly remarked, _"__when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, __however improbable__, must be the truth__"_.

"He'll still be solving cases." It seems as the most childish of deductions the very second it leaves his lips, something that he should have seen right from the very beginning and yet even Mycroft responds,

"Of course, how very stupid of me to miss something so very obvious and yet I suspect that's precisely why Sherlock believes himself safe. The best place to hide things is, after all, in plain sight."

"I'll go snaffle out a few leads, shall I, see if we can't learn something about what sort of anonymous tip offs the Yard's been getting on their more challenging cases?"

"Thank you, Paterson. As for us, Dr, there's a fine scotch in my room here in the club that I think would suit if you're game."

It's a suspicious offer, of course, but right now drinking himself into oblivion feels like the best idea in the entire world, and the lovely little addition of knowing that he'd be doing it at Mycroft's expense pushes thing enough that he's up on his feet stating, "Sounds like a plan," before his head has a chance to start thinking sensible thoughts again.

O

T: As always next chapter next week, until then feel free to review and ask whatever you wish…though I may whitewash answers if I feel I may spoil things!


	5. The Rest Bite

5. The Rest bite.

T: In which John spends an hour or so 'shooting the breeze' with Mycroft…I promise it's less of an apocalyptic foreboding than it sounds! Warnings remain the same; I still own a good 98% of this modern verse Guthrie and, technically, this particular incarnation of Sherrinford, but nothing else, more's the pity!

O

There was an intimacy to Mycroft's private room that made him feel somewhat as though he was intruding, they weren't, after all, friends even by the longest stretch of the word and, if he was honest, he wasn't all that sure that was much scope for them becoming as such.

Oh he was certain there was more to Mycroft than the hard verbal picture Sherlock had drawn him once, especially now that he understood the reason behind the younger man's apparent antipathy to his elder sibling and had met the bright, eccentric, man whom the elder Holmes named his husband.

The thing was Mycroft had the same manner of treating people as his father had, all clinical detachment until familiarity suited him better and non-malicious manipulating of actions for the other's 'greater good'.

He understood well how neither of them meant any harm by it, that it was just the way they were, but he'd seen what his father's way of things had done to Harry despite all the good intentions and thus he mistrusted it still.

It was one of the reasons he'd eventually settled on becoming a military doctor, for it'd meant having to lodge at whichever base wanted him and thus a chance at his own life.

On that matter he felt he could sympathise with Sherrinford and it was frightening how easily he could see the logic of the other's act of patricide…the choice to manipulate Sherlock, to punish the boy for something in which he'd had no real influence, however…

"Much as curiosity, a true psychopath needs no true logic behind their actions. Both my brother and I have experienced this fact first hand, Dr and it is, I think, why Sherlock is so very keen to correct people when they use that word to describe his character."

"Perhaps you could pretend that you're a normal human being for once and let me keep my head to myself, you know, out of the kindness of your heart?"

"I apologise, Dr, I fear it has become somewhat a habit."

"Hm, for yourself and for Sherlock."

"Then perhaps it is a form of defence, a way of ensuring that we are always in control…always the ones with the power."

"Perhaps, you'll have to go to a physiologist if you want any form of definitive answer."

"Talking things through is not always the best course of action, as you well know, Dr." A lengthy pause as Mycroft pours them both a sizable glass of the promised scotch and then he enquires, "Have you thought about what comes next, Dr?"

He rolls the drink on his tongue, takes in the flavour of smoky peat and the slight after kick of the alcohol and, when he still can't quite grasp to what Mycroft is referring he states,

"Sorry, you've lost me."

"Patterson shall find Sherlock, or at least the way to get to wherever Sherlock has buried himself and I'm simply curious as to what your next move is."

Of course Mycroft has a point, he really, really, should be using this moment of 'down time' to get his head around the…spikier…edges of stuff thrown out by this 'case' and yet a part of him is still pretty desperate to just blank it all away.

He's reminded, forcefully of his 16th birthday party, of Harry turning up with a skinny brunette on her arm who was most decidedly not a man or even 'their sort' whatever the hell that meant and the giant shouting match the entire affair had fallen into.

Mum had pulled him into the kitchen after about ten minutes, looked at him with eyes that'd told him she 'knew' and he'd blurted out that he was thinking of enlisting because it was something else to talk about.

Apparently his head had long since decided to implement its own warped version of 'don't ask, don't tell', though he couldn't help feeling that there would be a stupidly large bill behind finding out either when or why it'd chosen to do as such.

Right now he's just a little too mentally exhausted to much argue with the habit and thus he responds simply,

"I'm not all too and, to be honest, that's probably for the best right now. Somehow if I start thinking too many steps ahead I'm going to completely snap…which is only a good thing for my therapist and somehow I don't think one of her patience having a mental break is going to do anything for her reputation."

Mycroft smiles a smile that says he's passed some obscure test and enquires,

"So would you like to sit here in slightly unnerved silence or shall we give that 'small talk' thing a go?"

Option 'b' is a welcome chance to switch off his higher mental processes, while his mouth babbles on about inane things he's heard on TV or picked up over the internet. Mycroft talks a little about the less sensitive areas of his work and somewhere along the line they find they share a mutual loathing for all the red tape that becomes tangled into everything you do while in the governments employ.

The older man is just recounting a particularly fascinating anecdote involving a handful of Bulgarian dignitaries and a somewhat uncooperative customs agent when a knock on the door signals Guthrie's return.

Gone is the suit, replaced with a somewhat scruffier ensemble of well worn jeans and several layers of ratty, stained, t-shirts.

Mycroft raises a single eyebrow at the change, to which Guthrie frowns fiercely before stating,

"I can't exactly go plugging at the grittier contacts dressed up like I'm going to see the Queen and anyway your lovely little guard dog's already given me a right old dressing down without you shoving in your two bits."

Wordlessly the elder man passes his husband a drink and gestures to the last unoccupied seat in the room before enquiring,

"What have we learned?"

"Apparently letters keep appearing on Inspect Lestrade's desk detailing handy hints on particularly tricky cases, no one quite knows how they get into the yard and they've always been written by a slightly different hand."

"You brought a letter back with you, I assume."

"Please, I know you'd lecture me half to death if I didn't!" Guthrie responds as he passes a basic, bog standard, envelope over into Mycroft's waiting hand.

"Hmm the penmanship of the address on this particular envelope would suggest a young child or perhaps an elderly individual suffering from some debilitating ailment such as Parkinson's. No scent and the quality of the paper within would suggest a bulk purchase from WHSmith…ah now this is interesting." The older man is up on his feet but a moment after that remark, working his way through the seemingly endless draws on his desk until he pulls out an impossibly immaculate brass microscope.

A long moment as he examines the envelope and then he enquires,

"You wouldn't happen to name a botanist amongst your acquaintances would you, Dr?"

"No. What've you found?"

"Pollen, in a distribution that suggests it was deposited off someone's finger tips. As our good inspector is a long term sufferer of severe hay-fever I can not see his fingers being behind the imprint and that leaves us with the distinct possibility that it was left by one of the three individuals at the other end of the chain."

"Three individuals?"

"The letters author, its currier and Sherlock."

"Ah, determine which plant the pollen came from and thus determine what geographical location we're on about."

"Indeed, though it may yet prove to be a somewhat generic flower species."

"Still it's something." He remarks before stating, "Given how much info they've already got on these letters it's clear the yard is curious about their author, so I'm thinking that if we anonymously send this one back and inform Lestrade about that pollen he's likely to send it out to someone who can give him quick results…at which point we sweep back in."

"Alternately we could simply hack our way into the Yards records and find their botanist of choice that way." The matter of fact way in which Mycroft makes the statement has him shivering a little to himself and stating,

"You know I'd somehow managed to entirely forget about the covert James Bond villain thing you'd got going on."

"I think, perhaps, in that scenario I would slot more into the 'm' role than that of the villain and yet I appreciate the sentiment, Dr."

O

T: Somehow the guy watching the door at the Diogenes is used to people turning up in all sorts of clothing wishing to see Mycroft thanks to Sherlock's disguise habit and I can see his stubbornness with Guthrie is because he feels him 'not their sort' rather than a lack of recognition. Either that or Mycroft has asked him to give Guthrie a hard time when he turns up in scruffy threads to try and train him into wearing suits out of habit! Anyway next chapter next week, until then maybe drop me a review?


	6. The Trail

6. The trail. 

T: In which we're on the first steps towards the end so more end tying and thus more exposition! Basically we're in the same sort of warning situation as in the previous chapter! I own 98% of modern verse Guthrie, this incarnation of Sherrinford and a few other bits you're going to see in this chapter, but not what remains!

O

Somewhere outside the plush and ridiculously isolated surroundings of his current location lurked the crowded chaos that was the morning train.

He'd been cycling the thought about his head from the very instant he'd gotten to Clapham Junction and realised that not only would he be riding first class for literally the first time in his life, but that his only other companion in the carriage would be Guthrie.

Not that he was complaining, mind you, a train journey without a sweaty arm pit right next to your nose and an actual seat was the holy grail for a long term commuter such as himself, after all, but reserving the entire carriage smacked of upper class snobbishness.

Ok, John, breathe deep and get your head back onto the matter in hand.

Apparently the stain on the letter had actually been the composite of nectar, pollen and other trace elements that bees secreted as waste, which meant that whoever had left the print had a high likelihood of being a beekeeper.

The pollen itself was from a flower known as the Childing Pink which grew exclusively on Shoreham beach in West Sussex.

Which is how he'd end up sat in this practically cavernous train cabin at 9am trying not to think about just what the other passengers might be saying about him.

"I'm afraid it's not something you get used to either." The remark comes somewhat out of thin air and Guthrie smiles a little at his confused expression before stating, "Sorry, guess I'm also picking up the bad Holmesian mind reading habit. Your face says the stupid excessiveness is making you feel a little put out and I wanted to warn you that it's not something that you become acclimatised to."

For a moment his head continues to run through the many possible nasty things being whispered about by the total strangers all of a train carriage away, then it registers the point Guthrie had been pressing towards and he enquires,

"Sorry, you're telling me Sherlock's loaded?"

"Yes, though I'm not all too certain why that should be news to you…I mean you honestly didn't think Mycroft had gotten as rich as he is simply because he's powerful, did you?"

He knows Guthrie didn't mean to make it sound like he's some form of imbecile, understands that the other likely hasn't been kept up to speed about the whys and wherefores of just how he'd gotten into Sherlock's life in the first place, because it's not the sort of thing that Mycroft will see as relevant.

He also knows that he should get the ex-journalist 'up to speed', that knowing all the details, no matter how tiny or insignificant they seem to you, is very important if only thanks to the amazing powers of an alternative perspective.

However…if Sherlock did have money then that means the flat share had been some form of bizarre social experiment and that their…friendship…had been built up on a lie.

It's a thing has him feeling an intense sort of vertigo and so embarrassingly as though he's likely to burst into tears that he is stating, "You know the two of you being married entirely came way off centre," all of a breath later because he needs the benign chatter that's sure to follow as a distraction.

"Sorry, I thought that if I introduced myself as a kind of detached party I'd be a little more welcome than if I came to you as the husband of Sherlock's 'greatest enemy'."

"That I get…it's the concept of someone voluntarily putting up with Mycroft that's hard to grasp onto."

A smile, a roll of laughter that speaks of genuine amusement and a somewhat carefree attitude to the entire thing, then he states,

"Yeh it caught me by surprise as well."

"So, where'd it all begin?"

"The day I learned the truth of the motive behind Themis's crimes…I stepped out of the studio flat Sherlock was holed up in at the time and right into a grim faced lackey."

"Given how determined you were to find that story I can't imagine Mycroft's usual technique worked all that well."

"Oh it flopped spectacularly and that made me interesting to him, which, in turn, lead to him basically destroying my entire carer so that I'd come work for him, which lead to me spending almost 24 7 in his company, which lead to him growing somewhat attached to me, which lead to his basically sabotaging every relationship I got into and eventually pretending he'd been sent some form of stupidly virulent, rare, disease in a booby trapped snuff box."

It is a sign of how far his head has been shifted since meeting Sherlock that this last statement raises surprise not because of the dramatics involved in such a plan, or the shear amount of time it must have taken to pull off, but that it was Mycroft at it's centre.

Still if anyone had come up to him right at the beginning, when he was certain he was half crazy for even agreeing to flat share with someone who might just murder him in his sleep, and told him that he'd actually be minutes away from a mental breakdown simply because he'd learned that maybe, just maybe, that someone had only suggested the flat share for the sake of 'science'…

…yeh he'd have laughed until his sides hurt.

Perspective really was a very strange thing, when it came down to it.

"There's something on your mind, isn't there Dr?"

"Yeh but I'd rather not talk about it…hell I'd rather I wasn't even thinking about it."

A nod of understanding, then Guthrie is stating, "I thought we'd try the local schools first, go with the child angle first before we even contemplate the needle in haystack fun of the old person one."

"Right and what's our story?"

"No story, teachers are particularly perspective to lies, after all."

"If Sherlock is at the end of this trail he's going to have ears dotted everywhere and the second he knows we're looking for him he'll be gone."

"Which is why we won't be asking after Sherlock, or, indeed, talking names at all."

"You're showing them a photograph?"

"Two actually…don't worry I'll all make sense by the time we're done."

"Hm and it's not being explained to me right now because?"

"It's kind of visual."

"Of course it is."

X

Three schools later he'd given up joining Guthrie, come to the startling realisation that, actually, he wasn't as good with children as he'd fooled himself into believing he was and that the other man possessed some form of strange magical power.

As a doctor one had to have some affability, a face that people trusted and he'd always managed to charm his way out into or out of situations. Which was why he'd basically given the cause up as entirely lost when he'd come face to face with receptionist at the first school…because the sour expression on her face had basically looked as though it'd been carved into place.

Yet Guthrie had only had to smile for her to be simpering as though she was 16 rather than 61 and handing over school secrets in casual flirtation.

The children had been the same, all tantrums and the stubborn pigheadedness individuals of that age believed made them adults, while he was around yet perfect angels whenever they were chatting to Guthrie.

Recognising that he was basically becoming a bit of a loose end he'd made his excuses and nipped off down into the town centre to grab some cheep food and a little collection of soft drinks.

He'd wondered along the beech for a while after that, taking in the sea breeze and letting his mind simply drift off in the rhythm of the surf.

At some point a grubby mess of a man who was more beard than face and smelt like the back end of the really ratty pubs one found in the south end, comes to 'keep him company' for a while.

A gentle sort of man, if the expression muddied up in the craziness of dark, dark, brown eyes was anything to go by and he'd humoured him a bit despite the muttering and the conversation not making very much sense.

Guthrie comes to 'rescue' him eventually, the bright grin on his face prompting an enquiry of,

"I take it things went well."

"Very well indeed," he responds before gesturing to a small little cottage not a stones throw from where they are standing and stating, "Our next stop."

Silence follows, likely because Guthrie still believes this entire thing needs some form of visual input and he weathers it because he's really had enough of guessing and second guessing things.

The cottage door is opened by a slight man dressed up to the gills in tweeds and tartans that scream 'country squire.' Theatrics, of course, which means there's a something this unknown person is hiding, which makes him nervous…given the circumstances.

"Well, well, Patterson Guthrie, I certainly didn't expect you to be seeing you again any time soon." Educated, accented and also another very cleaver piece of showmanship.

Curiosity spikes a little at the revelation of an association between the stranger and the ex-journalist, only to be squashed by the sour look that crosses Guthrie's face very briefly and the somewhat brash way in which he states,

"I want to talk to Irene."

"Ah, in which case you two of you should come in."

Tea; hot; sweet and tasting basically of milk, is thrust into his hand all of ten seconds after he's settled into a chintzy sofa. As he drinks the beverage he wonders how this man had known his personal tea kinks, at how utterly mismatched the little knickknacks dotted about the space are despite it being clearly intended for one person and then…

Then a woman is strolling into the space, her height and build matching precisely that of the man who had strolled out all of five minutes ago, her eyes the same shocking green, yet her every other appearance as diametrically opposed as is possible.

"He's not here." She remarks as she settles herself, slowly, onto the very plain, basic, armchair tucked at the far corner of the room.

"No, but he's close, isn't he?"

"Perhaps," she smiles, the thing clearly fragile and all the truer for that fact, then remarks, "We're being unfair to the good doctor."

"Fine, fill him in why don't you. I'm going for a smoke." With that he's gone fast and hard enough that the door crashes closed with enough force to shake the house a little.

"You'll have to forgive him, Dr, I think seeing Michale again was harder than he'd forced himself to believe it would be."

"Right,"

"The answer to the first question swimming in your head is 'multiple personality disorder' though that's simplifying the entire affair somewhat. The answer to the second is a long story, better left for a more appropriate time…though I will say that you've got a hold of entirely the wrong end of the stick." The smile goes then, along with everything about her that was warm and safe, rather than fractured into sharp, perilous, pieces. "As to the third…Michale's family estate bordered onto the Holmes's, he grew up with Sherrinford, worshiped him to the point of creating me so that they could be together and still he married someone else.

"Sherlock kept visiting though, even 'after' when he'd gotten…darker…a little to understand the criminal turn I'd taken in life and a little because he felt he needed to keep me free for Sherrinford; because he had the misconceived idea that his brother actually loved me and would come back for me 'one day'.

"Sherri knew, of course, because Sherri knew everything and so when he did come back he put my name on that list of people he intended to kill. When he murdered me, you see, he'd at last have proven, beyond doubt, that he was hollow…that human life was as insignificant to him as the life of a single ant, and as easily extinguishable.

"A chance Sherlock never let him have."

Themis had never been caught; his killings had simply stopped just as the Rippers had all those long years previous. Of course the police had chased after him for a while afterward, the press placing more and more pressure on them for some form of answer, because otherwise it looked like a white wash.

Eventually the shear amount of money being pumped into the investigation had started to raise more eyebrows than the lack of progress and, just like that, the press had started demanding an instant closure of the case.

He knows this, knows that she knows it also and that the whole thing had been cycled in the media so often that everyone would also have this knowledge to hand.

Thus there can be but one way to interpret her statement and right at this very moment he finds that he can not care, finds that more than anything he just wants to see Sherlock and hug the life out of him, because really it's a wonder the man isn't stark raving bonkers for all that he's gone through.

So he drinks the last of his tea and then enquires, "Will you tell me where he is, Irene?"

O

T: Childing Pink is, indeed, all but exclusive to the Shoreham coat line and bees do, indeed, leave trace amounts of pollen in their refuse. I'm not all too sure what promoted me to go in this direction with Irene, but I liked how it turned out and how well it all managed to slot into the plot as a whole so I stuck with it! Final chapter next week, until then why not review or at least favourite so I know I'm doing something right!


	7. The End Of The Line

7. The End Of The Line.

T: One final chapter and up, up, up goes the Slash warning. Oh and a semi open end just because it felt right for where everyone is right now…plus I may play with this verse again somewhere down the line if the muse so takes me! I own nothing that you see in this chapter, more's the pity!

X

"_Will you tell me where he is, Irene?"_

"_I'm not so certain he wants you to know…though he did take a little peep…look there's a nice little hotel a little up the beach, why don't you book yourself in for the night and I'll get back to you as soon as I can." _

'As soon as I can' had proved to be a phone call at some point just after midnight, which in normal circumstances would have irked the hell out of him despite it's clearly Sherlock influenced naivety of 'normal life'. In circumstances such as the ones he'd been existing in since The Beginning, however, it'd had him all but jumping for his phone.

"_Hello, Irene?" _

"_There's a wonderful little fort to the East end of the beach that I'd highly recommend you visit tomorrow, though perhaps not before midday, I'd hate for you to miss it at it's best." _

Coded and strange and yet more of a hint that Sherlock lay somewhere deep at its heart.

So he'd done what he could to make himself look as though he'd not only slept, but had done so in a lovely set of PJ's rather than the clothes he'd rolled down in, made a face at the sheet rain that was the weather of choice for the afternoon and then stepped 'into the breach'.

Beautiful Victorian, militaristic, lines in a pretty mix of brick and rounded, fist sized, stones….indeed everything a fort of the era should be and walking about it had his lips twisting into the proud smile he'd not worn since his turning out parade.

At some point he ends out propping himself up on one of the round cannon battalions, a little to further admire how lovingly the place has been restored and a little to take in the view.

His eyes catch the faintest glimmer of sun flashing amid the raindrops and cascading against the waves of the vast ocean stretching out before him in an unnervingly fractured rainbow, and, just like that, his head drifts onto darker paths.

Given all he knows now about Sherlock's past he can at last see that what most had viewed as an almost psychopathic detachment from 'normal life'; what he'd thought likely some un-detected social interaction disorder, was actually deep seated cynicism.

Thus turning to Irene…Michale…this other, without as much as a second thought, is a very significant thing indeed.

Attractive, clearly intelligent and someone he can picture Sherlock sharing his life with for all their mutual eccentricities.

Right and apparently, right here miles from the city he called home; soaked to the bone and existing on a particularly dangerous cocktail of copious cups of coffee and all of 2 hours sleep; is when he's finally going to allow himself to accept that he's mind numbingly in love with his house mate.

It's entirely irrational, especially as it's been there germinating away since day one when he'd been told, somewhat bluntly, that there was more chance of hell freezing over than there was of Sherlock ever thinking of him in that way...or anyone else, for that matter.

Still now that he's had the 'light bulb' moment he finds that he can't quite shunt the emotion back where it'd come from, or indeed distract himself entirely from the reality of their existence.

"I still can not see the logic" The statement makes no sense at all, which is typical of Sherlock's usual style of assuming that everyone else is on the same page as him and manages to tamp down the sudden rush of hormones that cease at him at the simple sound of that easy, well educated, voice.

Which is why he can feel safe about turning around without letting Sherlock see, instantly, how much he's just realised he cares and thus make things even more…complex…than they are now.

The younger man is stood a good foot away, beneath a cheep little umbrella, dressed in an array of layers so unusually casual that he almost manages to miss that he's gotten impossibly thinner. Even with the distance he can see those sharp eyes moving at an impossible rate of knots, taking in the little changes and linking them together into a deduction that has him stepping even further away.

"You know then." Which, given the reaction, means Sherlock can see, somehow, that he has been told all about Sherrinford.

Of course a normal person would likely feel betrayed at being lied to so completely, might even feel angry or disgusted that they had allowed themselves to trust a murder. This really isn't a normal situation, however and even if it had been he's never really been on to tow the expected line.

Which Sherlock should know by now…right?

"I suppose this is where you try to make me feel better, empty platitudes or perhaps sympathy before you run away with Mary to start a normal life. A life without the game, a life where children will be your adventure, the thing to stop your hands shaking and where I shall become…obsolete." He sounds so rational, as though he is simply cycling through yet another spool of deductions.

It is that…detachment…which somehow catches at the salt peter that peppers what is left of his control and sparks a fierce explosion of anger, the sort of which he hasn't felt since he caught one of his fellow soldiers half way towards raping an entirely defenceless woman because he felt it would teach 'respect'.

Back in that darker place he'd vented the anger in the only way that'd made sense, had all but killed the other man before another soldier had come and talked the sense back into him…had talked him back to the man he was rather than the man he thought he should be.

In this place…in this place his own head provides the rationality, has him squeezing out the rage through clenched fists and hard, deep, breaths.

Then…

A foot of distance crossed in what seems but a step, the sure sensation of bone beneath the thick textures of denim and cotton, then cool skin and the gentle silk of ink black hair.

Kissing Sherlock feels precisely as a first kiss should feel, all mashed lip and the fun of working through the right angles to avoid the bumping of noses or the smashing of teeth.

There are no fireworks…no magic spark of something…just a smug sense of satisfaction and a warm little background note of lust.

Eventually his fallible human nature requires him to come up for air, at which point he's fully prepared for just about everything other than being somewhat forcibly rammed against a very solid wall and treated to the most erotic kiss he'd ever experienced. Period.

Just at the point where his heads clicked into that lovely little primal mode and thus turned his thought trail basically into 'person who invented buttons bad, celibate, individual who deserves to rot in hell for all eternity', though not with any where near that coherency, Sherlock states,

"It really is raining very hard."

He can feel himself glowering through the mist of lust and then, suddenly, his higher thought processes are back along with the statement of,

"I don't even know a Mary, Sherlock."

"But of course you do, Mary Morstan, the insufferable blonde with the Indian issue…" He trails suddenly, shakes his head and remarks, "But of course you were in London at the time," before he breezes away.

Blink…let your head catch up with what's just happened John and now…

"Sherlock Holmes get your scrawny ass back here and explain what the hell is going on right this instant!"

X

T: I did more than my fair share of research as far as places to hold dramatic chats were concerned in Shoreham and much thanks goes to ./ for providing me with just what I was after as well as many photos so that I could get some form of descriptive feel for the place despite never having been there. Ever. Reviews are much appreciated and feel free to question, I really am very keen to play a little more in the sandbox I've created myself with this fic and enquiries might just wake the plot bunnies!


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